General

Whilst researching for my previous blog on Parish records, I came across a record of a couple getting married in St Mary’s Church Morpeth on the 13th of November 1943. They were Arthur James Turner aged 24, a soldier and a bachelor and Elizabeth Ann Hill also 24 and a spinster, so far not that remarkable. It gets interesting however when you note her address, which is given as St George’s Hospital, Morpeth.

St George’s Hospital was then the County Asylum, so was Elizabeth a patient there? Well after much searching through our patient records for the asylum no record of her could be found. We also searched their staff lists, but again found no record of her. We do not know of any other people living at the asylum who were married, whilst there either as a patient or as a member of staff, perhaps you know otherwise? If so, please let us know.

On their marriage record their fathers’ names and occupations and the names of the witness were also recorded. Elizabeth’s father was a Thomas Hill, a boilerman and one of the witnesses was a Daisy Hill. So, with this information I was able to do some more digging.

Using the 1939 Register, which is free to access via our computers, using the Ancestry website, I found Elizabeth, living at home with her father Thomas, Ethel (presumably her mother), Daisy (presumably her sister) and Cecil (presumably her brother).

As for the address, well this time it was Stannington Land Settlement number 29. I had no idea what this meant, so with a bit of ‘googling’ I discovered that the Land Settlement Association (LSA) was a scheme set up in 1934 by the then government to help unemployed workers, giving them a small holding, approximately 5 acres, to produce goods as part of a cooperative.

Turning to our own records [NRO 5702/1 Land Settlement Association file of correspondence], I was able to find some very interesting material relating to Northumberland’s only LSA site, Moor Farm at Stannington, near Morpeth. We are lucky enough to have information relating to the sale of the estate at the County Hotel in Newcastle on the 7th of January 1969. The sale catalogue lists the estate as comprising of

“The manager’s house with homestead and field. Eleven well-built semi-detached dwelling houses and 126.07 acres of highly productive arable land and 2.41 acres of scrub land.”

Lot number six of the catalogue relates to Elizabeth’s home (number 29 holding) and says the property consisted of a semi-detached brick-built house containing front entrance, living room, kitchen, larder, back porch, wc, coal house, 3 bedrooms and bathroom, an outbuilding suitable for conversion to a garage and a garden. Number 29 sold for £2,400.

Also included in our records are promotional pamphlets produced by the LSA giving information such as;

“All holdings are designed to provide a full-time occupation with pigs, poultry and horticulture, including glass (heated and cold) In no case are they suitable for dairy farming. The average rent is in the region of £75-£100. On each estate there is a central packing station where the tenants produce is graded, packed and sent to market. Capital of approx. £2,000 required to start and the Ministry for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food will loan up to three quarters of the cost on easy repayment terms for 15 yrs. Applicants must have some money to live on until the holding comes into production”

On each estate there was an estate manager and staff for small holders to consult with, although the requirement for previous horticultural or agricultural experience of min 5 years was stipulated.

According to Wikipedia between 1934 and 1939, 1,100 small holdings were established within 20 settlements. The allocation of settlements to the unemployed was suspended at the outbreak of the Second World War in order to increase food production. After the war the Association was incorporated within a County Council scheme for statutory provision of smallholdings designed as a first step for those going into agricultural production. In 1983 the scheme was wound-up, and all the properties were privatised, by which time it was producing roughly 40% of English home-grown salad crops. Quite an achievement!

There were other Land Settlement Association small-holding settlements around the country, situated at:

• Abington, Cambridgeshire

• Andover, Hampshire

• Broadwath, Cumbria

• Chawston, Bedfordshire

• Crofton, Cumbria

• Dalston, Cumbria

• Duxbury, Lancashire

• Elmesthorpe, Leicestershire

• Fen Drayton, Cambridgeshire

• Foxash, Essex

• Fulney, Lincolnshire

• Harrowby, Lincolnshire

• Newbourne, Suffolk

• Newent, Gloucestershire

• Oxcroft, Derbyshire

• Potton, Bedfordshire

• Sidlesham, Sussex

• Snaith, Yorkshire

• Yeldham, Essex

N.B. You may have noticed something strange about the photo of the 1939 register above. Our friend Elizabeth is initially recorded with the surname Hill, which was her name at the time, but this is crossed out and her married name of Turner is written above. We know that Elizabeth did not get married for another four years after the register, so how does her married name appear on the register?

The National Archives website explain that,

“The register was continually updated while National Registration was in force, when it was a legal requirement to notify the registration authorities of any change of name or address. This ended in 1952, but since 1948 the Register had also been used by the National Health Service, who continued updating the records until 1991, when paper-based record keeping was discontinued.

Changes of name for any reason were recorded; in practice this was mostly when women changed their surnames on marriage or re-marriage, but also includes changes of name for any other reason, such as by deed poll.

The majority of these name changes appear in the indexes so you can search for a person using either their name in 1939 or any subsequent name.

Worth knowing, happy searching!

Northumberland Archives is a heritage partner to a National Lottery Funded project, the ‘Northumberland Village Halls Heritage Project’. The project aims to celebrate the history of some of Northumberland’s Village Halls and ensure that records and memories are preserved for future generations. The project was developed by and is managed by Community Action Northumberland (CAN) whose mission is to benefit and help sustain rural communities in Northumberland. This blog was written by Lynn Hall.

This whole process started when towards the end of 2021 a former committee member contacted our chairman David Pentney and informed him she had six boxes of old information concerning the Village hall. When David looked through the boxes he found loads of history from the Village hall including the minute’s book used by the original trustees dating back to 1928.

However the book was looking a little fragile so he contacted Community Action Northumberland (CAN) for advice on restoration and how best to display the information. From that David arranged a meeting with CAN representative Tracey Morgan in early April which Nick & I attended, – being quite new to the village we were interested in its history, although we did not realise until we attended the meeting that our hall was enrolled on the CAN Village Hall history projectJ. Lucky for us we had all the info for our project contained within those boxes including two minutes books covering 1928 to 1999.

As part of the project Nick, David & I visited Northumberland Archives on 26th April meeting representatives from other Village halls who were doing the project. We were given a crash course on what materials can be used to preserve documents, as well as ideas on how to do any research we may need to do for our individual projects. We were also treated to a tour behind the scenes to see how they store documents so they are preserved for future generations, as well as how they are trying to get a lot of documents scanned for online viewing. It was a well presented and interesting tour.

Initially we were hoping to do a synopsis of both minute books which would form the central theme of our project, however as Nick worked his way through the minutes and we realised how time consuming this was we decided to focus on the 50 years up to 1978, which was still quite an undertaking. One of the biggest problems was deciphering the different handwriting styles over the years – we would think we had it cracked & then the minute taker would change and, therefore, the handwriting too! Another issue we had was getting information from the locals as we are new to the village so this was why we concentrated on the minute books.

As Nick continued with the synopsis he decided to include subsections on points of interest e.g. the caretaker – as there was a lot of discussion in early minutes on the caretaker’s duties & wages. We considered printing the synopsis into booklet form & distributing to villagers but as I typed Nick’s notes up it became apparent this would be too costly, so another idea is to put it on our website for people to read or download.

With the CAN/ National Lottery grant of £300 we have purchased some display boards. These will allow us to showcase all the information and photos we have at the coffee morning we are organising for the 26th November, hopefully we will have a good turnout as we are offering free coffee & biscuits. Anyone who wants a copy of the synopsis can have it emailed – also allowing us a platform to email them about future events.

Nick and I have certainly learned about the village through doing the project, with interesting anecdotes like the lamb which was offered as a raffle prize at an Easter dance – it did not mention if this was alive or butchered. Or the caretaker saga in the 1930s when the caretaker at the time was asked to take a pay cut from 7 to 5/- a week, when he refused new tenders were requested for his job – however his was the only tender they received at, you’ve guessed it, 7/- a week so he carried on in his role. Then there was all the Google searching we did when we were looking up e.g. a needle & thread race or old penny pitching which was part of a sports day held in 1930.

So although initially we wondered what we had let ourselves in for we feel it was worth doing.

This blog was written by one of our Archive Assistants.

Recently, staff from Northumberland Archives and Morpeth Road Academy, Blyth, teamed up and organised a local history walk complete with lesson plans and activities for Year 5 students. The day was divided up into two parts, a heritage walk with work sheets to complete and then lunch and activities at the Commissioners Building. 

I arrived early on a bright Friday morning to an already bustling school. After signing in at reception, our team and myself were escorted to the classroom of some very lively and enthusiastic Year 5 students.  

The group were instructed on the schedule of the day and reminded of the importance of manners and road safety while away from school. Coats, hats, activity sheets and packed lunches were gathered up and everyone set off. As we walked, we chattered and laughed. The children asked many questions! 

The Blyth Heritage Walk activity sheet was to be filled in by the students at various planned stops along the route. Some of them being; the site of the former train station, the Wallaw Cinema which was renovated and is now a pub, the old fire station and Crofton Mill Park. Staff prompted for answers and ideas using visual aids that showed the buildings as they had once been. 

On arrival at the Harbour Commissioners Office building, we were met by Clive Gray and Jane Stewart. They took us a tour of the building and explained its purpose in the past and enlightened us of its future of being transformed into an education centre/archive. The students particularly enjoyed sitting around the large table in the boardroom, pretending that they were taking part in an important meeting. 

The next 30 minutes was lunchtime. This was a noisy event! We were all hungry and sat down together in groups to eat our lunch. 

Once tidied away, it was time for our main lesson. Flip chart paper and pens were supplied to each group. 

Students were asked to focus on the needs of different members of the community, e.g., the elderly, primary school child, teenagers, people with difficulties, young mothers etc. They were encouraged to understand and produce changes that can be made to meet the needs of these groups of people and therefore make the town better. 

As I joined in, I noticed that the students were particularly good readers and even better at exchanging ideas and debating facts before deciding on their final ideas. Each group fed back their designs to the whole class who gave their opinion to the new town which was created. 

The afternoon walk back to school was not as lively as it had been earlier on in the day! Students were tired out but soon perked up when we got back to school and were allowed 15 minutes out in the playground before home time.